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I purchased a kite that apparently had a smoker in the house. When it arrived there was a strange scent on the sleeve(fabreeze?) not sure on the kite yet. I don't have a sense of smell and my buddy only took a whif of the sleeve so far. First he detected some freshener odor just before we headed out to mtn. bike. I left all the sleeves on the floor board of the car and on return I had him take another wif and he said he smelled smoke on the sleeves just by them sitting in the car for a couple of hours. He doesn't smoke.My biggest concern is stickin' the kite in my closet and having the odor get all over my clothes!!

What are my options if the kite wreaks of cigarette odor?

I do have another closet but the water heater is in it and I'm not sure if the heat from the electric water heater would cause damage to the kite or all my kites if I just stick them all in the same closet with the water heater.

Not a level one. It was purchased second hand though. Funny thing....I asked the guy if he was a smoker and he says yes. Now this was after he had already sent the kite and telling me that the kite was stored in a kite bag inside the closet. Low and behold.....it arrives smelling like Fabreeze. LOL!

Not to sure on spraying it down with anything in fear of damaging the sail.Hmmmm.......hope the air time does the trick!

How about the water heater closet for storing??? Anyone? <<<punn intended

I store all my kites in there sleeve and in a closet and from what I can see they all smell like smoke but I am a smoker and it goes were it wants to so I have stoped selling my kite cause I don't wnat to hurt anyones feeling cause they smell like smoke but that just me fly them and the smell will go away over time

That smell attaches itself to everything, anywhere, in the house of a smoker

We had a girl living at our house that came from a house of smokers, she stored stuff in our garage, and it took one bottle of fabreze and 2-3 weeks for the smell to diminish, I kept my kites in the truck while she was here.

I washed the sail of the kite using warm water and dish detergent, rinsed thoroughly, then let it dry in the sun (fully assembled). The kite spent the next week outside (in the garage at night, but outside in the breeze during the day) which helped get most of the smell out. I found that the cigarette smell clung to the dacron fabric much more stubbornly than the icarex. I wound up giving it a second treatment of dish soap and water which helped. Goo Gone can also cover or remove the smell from the more porous fabric segments (again, dacron or stitching).

Don't even think of putting it in the sleeve until you get the smell out of it, though. All you'll wind up doing is re-stinking the kite.

For the sleeve, I put it in the washing machine, cold water & gentle cycle with just a drop of detergent.

Then, I moved it to the dryer where I had it tumble dry on either low heat or air only, with about 5 sheets of bounce. (any dryer sheet should work here). Then, I hung it outside until it was completely dry. Once it was fully dry, I stuck it in a large ziploc bag with 3 dryer sheets and left it that way for about a week. The dryer sheets leeched the smoke smell out of the fabric.

Did it work? Well, I couldn't smell the smoke on it after that. For the real test, find Devin (adx1592) and ask him if he could tell the Total Eclipse had been kept in a smoker's house for 12+ years when he received it.

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